Anyone own a DW735 Planer(Dewalt)? Reviews are excellent on the planer but loads of complaints on the low quality knives Dewalt is supplying with it(poor wear characteristics) . I can get a great deal on the planer 'til the end of this month but the knife issue is bothering me...there are after-market replacements although they seem to get mixed reviews.

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I got a tiny nick in one blade disappointingly early on but they are reversible, so I just flipped it over. Eventually, I sharpened them. I can't really say if I felt they dullened quickly or not as it is my first set of blades. Nothing to compare to.

My advice would be to buy some oversized Japanese water stones & angle guide and sharpen them yourself. A good set of stones doesn't take long to pay for themselves compared to buying blades. Also pretty much required for maintaining chisels and hand planer blades.

Kind of fun too. There is something strangely satisfying about creating a mirror finish on your now deadly sharp chisel.

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With great power comes Awesome irresponsibility.

I used that WorkSharp on my old, cheap bench chisels and it got them to better than new. Ditto on a hand planer blade.

I have a 6" Jointer and a 13" Planer though, and I'd like to see what the better system would be for those blades.

Ken, sharpening seems to be an art in itself, and there are people who are really anal about it. I decided to bypass that learning curve and throw money at it. You may (or may not) want to Google "scary sharp" for one methodology.

FWIW, one of the biggest reasons why I'm willing to throw $$ at a system specifically for the lathe tools is that they require frequent sharpening....and if I have to step every 10-15 minutes to sharpen, I want THAT process to be accurate, repeatable and very, very quick. I'm not going to pull out a series of stones to take 10 minutes sharpening for every 15 minutes of wood turning.

Hey Mark,Here are some key things I learned from my neighbor back when I lived in my hometown. He was a master carpenter and by "master" I mean he was like a 6'3" Yoda of woodworking. I wish I had spent more time over there before he passed away but wood working wasn't exactly a priority for me when I was young. However, he would often teach me a few things as I needed help with repairs because my Dad's job kept him away all days except weekends.

It was actually only a couple of years ago that I bought stones again but his advice is still sound.

Basic Tips- Some stone types take longer to pre-soak then others. Make sure they are sufficiently saturated or they don't work/get wrecked.

- Keep the surface good and wet but without rinsing off too much of the slurry buildup. It's actually the slurry that is doing a lot of the cutting.

Here was the key for me that he pointed out. It removed all of my previous frustrations.- When I started, I wasn't rubbing long enough with the lower grits so I was wasting too much time and energy with the higher grits. If you keep checking, you can see the polish area build up as the blade starts to flatten against the stone. Don't switch to to a higher grit until you see the Entire blade surface is polished. That means it is now flat and the higher grit will now touch it all evenly. If the higher grit can not touch the entire blade evenly, then you are just wasting your time.

- Use a honing guide to hold the blade at the correct angle. Especially for hand planer blades where the correct angle is super important. Most guides come with an angle setting tool to set the various proper angles.

- Pick a guide that has a bevel mechanism. That is to say, when you have it perfectly sharp and polished, you twist a lever or whatever and it raises the blade angle just a degree or two. Do three or four more passes over the stone to create the sharper bevel angle right at the tip of the blade. This extra bevel makes all the difference in the world.

- I built a wooden jig that locks the stone into my water tray (an old, square tupperware cake dish I salvaged). I glued some rubber pads to the bottom of the dish to keep it from slipping on my bench. You obviously need need to be able to hold the stone steady. A tray is not required but it will mean that you don't soak and stain your bench from all the slurry.

- I have a sheet of plate glass that I picked up from a window shop and a small bottle of silicone carbide grit. If you suspect that the stones are losing thier perfect flat shape. Pour some grit and water onto the glass and rub your stone all over the glass. The glass is naturally flat and the resulting slurry will true up the stone.

Stones (you need more than one.)I have four different grits of stones. I find the reversible, 1000/4000 is all I need if I don't get lazy and let the blades go downhill to far.

I have a 200 that has come in handy when I have chipped a blade on a surprise nail and have to take a lot of metal of to get it flat again. I also pull it out if someone brings me a really old or beat up blade that needs a lot of work.

I have an 8000 that is really just a polishing blade but I find even the 4000 gives me a mirror finish. I only use the 8000 when I'm feeling particularly energetic or want to feel like a samurai.

Why bother?It sounds like a lot of work, but once you realize you can and should use the lower grit longer than you think, it actually becomes quiet fast and effective. Sometimes it just feels nice to do something old-school as well. I also find it safer for my more valued chisels as I'm certainly not praised for my steady hands.

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With great power comes Awesome irresponsibility.

How do you plan on sharpening the curved lathe tools. Tim, the wood Yoda mentioned above (not The Toolman), had a huge hardwood block where he had a strip cut into it by each one of his lathe tools. He had sticks of some kind of rubbing compound that he rubbed into the channels. He then rubbed the lathe tool down the channel that was naturally the perfect fit for that tool.

I've seen this technique and the compound described in Lee Valley catalogs but I've never owned a lath or carving tools so I've never tried it. His tools were always razor sharp though, so I know it works.

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With great power comes Awesome irresponsibility.

As linked to earlier, I plan on purchasing a WoodCraft sharpening kit that consists of an 8" slow-speed grinder and Wolverine jigs (shown here on YouTube).

It seems like it's a very fast way to touch up your lathe tools as you're turning. My understanding is that lathe tools really don't need a mirrored, ultra-sharp edge the way bench chisels and planer irons do. The jig allows you to maintain the proper angle.

Apologies Ken for putting Mark's name at the top of my post to you. I probably had my question in mind about the curved lathe tools when I did that.

Mark.Thanks for the vid. I wasn't envisioning the tool for rotating the round blades on the wheels. Although my old sharpening Yoda would probably have gasped at the jagged edge and uneven bevel it showed as a result in the video. However, you are no doubt correct. You probably just do not need the level of precision on a lathe tool that he would have aspired to.

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With great power comes Awesome irresponsibility.